The orderly on the first bus was sitting at attention, with arms
folded, waiting for orders. It was just dawn, but the interior of his
bus was clean and ready. He always fixed it up at night, when the rest
of us, dog tired, crept into the dank straw, saying we could get up
extra early and do it.
So now we were up "extra early," chauffeurs tinkered with engines,
and orderlies fumigated interiors; and the First Orderly, sitting at
the head of the column, where he heard things, and saw things, got
acquainted with Trevelyan.
The seven American motor ambulances were drawn up with a detachment
of the British Red Cross in a small village near B----, the railroad
where the base hospital was located, way up near the Belgian frontier.
The weather was cold. We had changed the brown paint on our busses to
gray, making them less visible against the snow. Even the hoods and
wheels were gray. All that could be seen at a distance were the two big
red crosses blinking like a pair of eyes on the back canvas flaps. The
American cars were light and fast and could scurry back out of shell
range quicker than big, lumbering ambulances--of which there was a
plenty. Therefore we were in demand. The morning that the First Orderly
met Trevelyan our squad commander was in conference with the fat major
of the Royal Army Medical Corps concerning the strenuous business of
the day.
Both the First Orderly and Trevelyan were Somebodys. It was apparent.
It was their caste that attracted them to each other. The First Orderly
was a prominent figure in the Paris American colony; he knew the best
people on both sides of the Atlantic. Now he was an orderly on an
ambulance because he wanted to see some of the war. He wanted to do
something in the war. There were many like him--neutrals in the ranks
of the Croix Rouge.
The detachment of the Royal Army Medical Corps to which Trevelyan
belonged arrived late one night and were billeted in a barn. The
American corps were in the school house, sleeping in straw on the wood
floor. A small evacuation hospital was near where the wounded from the
field hospitals were patched up a little before we took them for a long
ambulance haul.
Trevelyan was only an orderly. The American corps found this "quaint,"
as Trevelyan himself would have said. For the orderly of the medical
corps corresponds to the "ranker" of the army. In this war, at a time
when officers were the crying demand, the gentlemen rankers had almost
disappeared. Among the American volunteers, being the squad commander
was somewhat a matter of choice and of mechanical knowledge of our
cars. We all stood on an equal footing. But Trevelyan was simply
classed as a "Tommy," so far as his medical officers were concerned.
So he showed a disposition to chum with us. He gravitated more
particularly to the First Orderly, who reported to the chauffeur of the
second bus that Trevelyan had a most comprehensive understanding of the
war; that he had also a keen knowledge of medicine and surgery, with
which the First Orderly had himself tinkered.
They discussed the value of the war in several branches of surgery.
The chauffeur of the second bus heard Trevelyan expounding to the
First Orderly on the precious knowledge derived by the great hospital
surgeons in Paris and London from the great numbers of thigh fractures
coming in--how amputations were becoming always fewer--the men walked
again, though one leg might be shorter.
Trevelyan, in his well-fitting khaki uniform, seemed from the same
mold as hundreds of clean-built Englishmen; lean face, blond hair. His
accent was faultlessly upper class. The letter "g" did not occur as a
terminating consonant in his conversation. The adjectives "rippin'" or
"rotten" conveyed his sentiments one way or the other. His hand clasp
was firm, his eye direct and blue. He was a chap you liked.
At our midday meal, which was served apart for the American contingent,
the First Orderly asked the corps what they thought of Trevelyan. "I've
lived three years in England," said the chauffeur of the second bus,
"and this fellow seems to have far less 'side' than most of his class."
The First Orderly explained that this was because Trevelyan had become
cosmopolitan--traveled a lot, spoke French and Spanish and understood
Italian, whereas most Englishmen scorned to learn any "foreign" tongue.
"Why isn't he in a regiment--he's so superior!" wondered the chauffeur
of the second bus. The First Orderly maintained stoutly that there was
some good reason, perhaps family trouble, why his new friend was just
a common orderly--like himself.
The entire column was then ordered out. They hauled wounded from the
field hospital to the evacuation camp until nightfall. After dusk they
made several trips almost to the trenches. But there were fewer wounded
than usual. The cold had lessened the infantry attacks, though the
artillery constantly thundered, especially at nightfall.
New orders came in. They were:--Everything ready always for a possible
quick advance into L----, which was then an advance post. An important
redistribution of General French's "contemptible little army" was hoped
for. At coffee next morning our squad commander, after his customary
talk with the fat major, admonished us to have little to say concerning
our affairs--that talk was a useless adjunct to war.